1702-1902. The two hundredth anniversary of the First Parish church of Stow, Massachusetts

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1702 1902

The

Two Hundredth Anniversary

of the

First Parish Church

of

Stow

Massachusetts

Sermons by
REV. J. SIDNEY MOULTON, Pastor

and

SAMUEL COLLINS BEANE, D.D.

July 27, 1902

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First parish i xitariax church, stow, mass.

THE HOME-COMING AT STOW.

THE first' settlers of this town organized a Church vSociety
which now, after a life of two centuries, has a firm hold
upon their descendants. On July 27, a commemorative
service was held, with many friends from neighboring towns and
societies present. The church was well decorated with cut
flowers and plants in honor of the event that had called them
together. The Reception Committee, of which Mrs. F. W. Warren
was Chairman, did well their part to make the social side a success,
and many old friendships were renewed upon a formal introduction.

Those who took part in the services held morning and evening
were as follows : Rev. J. vS. Moulton, Pastor ; Samuel C. Beane,
D.D., of Newburyport; Rev. J. P. vSheafe, of Harvard ; Rev. J. N.
Pardee, of Bolton; Rev. C. H. Washburn, of Mayuard ; Rev. J. R.
Cushiug, of Gleasondale; Rev. E. F. Hayward,of Marlboro; Rev.
J. Baltzby, of Hudson ; and Mr. W. H. Clark, of Stow.

The music was under the direction of Mr. W. A. Wood, Chorister,
and Miss Bertha F. Lawrence, Organist, with the following pro-
gram : —

Morning. Organ voluntary. Sentences. Original hymn. Re-
sponsive reading. Anthem, " The King of Glory Shall Come in."
Prayer. Response, Choir. Scripture lesson. Anthem, " Great is
the Lord." Sermon, Samuel C. Beane, D.D., on the "Religious
Nurture and Progress of New England during the last Two Hundred
Years, as seen in the Liberal Congregational Church of Stow."
Hymn, " The House Our Fathers Built to God." Benediction.

Evening. Organ voluntary. Anthem, " Sing Unto God." Scrip-
ture reading, Rev. J. P. Sheafe. Response, Choir. Addresses: Rev.
J. Baltzby, "Religious Gains"; Mr. W. H. Clark, "What the
Church stands for To-day" ; Rev. E. F. Hayward, " The Unitarian
Church of To-day " ; Rev. J. R. Cushing, " The Methodist Church
of To-day. Anthem, " God of Our Fathers." Addresses: Rev. C. H.
Washburn, " The Orthodox Church of To-day " ; Rev. J. N. Pardee,
" The Outlook for the Country Church " ; Rev. J. P. Sheafe, " The
Church of To-morrow." Summary and benediction, Samuel C.
Beane, D.D.

This was an event long to be remembered in the annals of the
vSocietv.

TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

CHRONOLOGICAL PAGE.

Town of Stow incorporated, May i6

First Meeting-House erected ....

Church organized, under Rev. J. Eveleth

Second Meeting-House erected

Third Meeting-House erected

Fourth Meeting-Hoiise erected

Sunday-vSchool organized, June 6 .

Stoves put into Meeting-House entry

Bell presented by Mrs. Abigail Eveleth

Church becomes Unitarian ....

Organized as the First Parish

Reorganized, under Rev. W. H. Kinsley

Fourth Church burned, Nov. 9 . . .

Fifth Church (present house) erected .

Tower-clock presented by Mrs. Hale and Mrs. \\

Parsonage presented by Col. Elijah Hale

New Organ provided b}^ subscription

Last Covenant adopted .....

Two Hundredth Anniversary, July 27 .

1683

1686

1702

1713

1752

1827

1830

1832

1832

1833

1834

1840

1847

1848

hitney

1869

1870

1892

1895

1902

Notes.

The bell, presented in 1832 by Mrs. Abigail Eveleth, widow of the
Rev. J. Eveleth, was tolled for the first time on the occasion of her
funeral, a few days after being put in place. In the fire of 1847 it
fell and was cracked, bxit was recast and now hangs in the belfry.

The first meeting-house stood at what is now called the Lower
Village. The second one north of " Strong Water Brook," or near
the present residence of Mrs. F. W. Warren. The third one near
the site of the Center School. The fourth was erected upon the
site of the present church building.

IflRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS.

LIST OF MINISTERS AND PERIODS OF SERVICE.

Rev. John Eveleth

Rev. John Gardner

Rev. Jonathan Newell

Rev. James Kendall

Rev. Mr. Chickering .

Rev. John L. vSiblev

Rev. Jonathan Farr

Rev. Matthew Harding

Rev. William H. Kinsley

Rev. Reuben Bates

Rev. George F. Clark

Rev. F, W. Webber

Rev. John F. Locke

Rev. David P. Muzzv

Rev. Mr. Dyer

Rev. Thomas Weston

Rev. J. Sidney Moulton (present Pastor)

1701-1718

1718-1775

1775-1828

1828

1828-1829

1829-1833. 1835

1836

■ • 1837

I 840- I 846

1846-1859

1862-1867

1869-1870

1870-1872

1872-1876

. 1877

1878-1885

. 1885

TO ESTABLISH A FUND.

As has been suggested at these meetings, an effort is being made
to create a fund whereby the support and repairs of this Church
may be assured. It is hoped that the friends of the Society,
although they may have left the town, will not forget that it stands
in need of their financial aid and assistance, and that what encour-
agement they can now offer may renew the life of the Society and
keep afresh the interest that has been theirs for so many years.

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS.

SERMON BY REV. J. S. MOULTON, PASTOR.

Delivered Sunday, July 20, 1902.

" God, cC'/w at sintdry times and in divers maiiiiers spake in times
past unto t tie fat tiers liy tfie propliets liatli in tfiese tast days spoken
unto ns tn' tiis Son, ivtiom lie Iiatli appointed lieir of all tilings.

HEB. I. I, 2.

Historical.

These words suggest a theme which is both interesting and
profitable — that is, the continuance of faith — the fact that through
manifold changes of form and after many years, that faith in God,
once planted in the soul, is found there still — a song in the heart
of humanity which never dies.

I shall, however, speak of this theme only incidentalh'. My
piirpose to-day is quite other.

I do not wish to trench upon ground which may be covered bj-
Doctor Beane next vSunday, nor would I anticipate anything which
may be said by other speakers ; but I should like, since we shall
have no paper dealing specifically with our local history, to recall,
a few of the salient points — a few interesting facts — concerning
the two hundred years which now look down upon us as a religious
society. I shall say nothing not well known to the older ones of
us, but the younger generations may not be familiar with the story
of our past.

To the men and women who founded this society two centuries
ago, religion was a profound realit^^ It underlaj- everything they
did. They lived constantly in the thought of God. It was a con-
dition imposed bj- the General Coixrt in granting permission to
form a township of Stow that there shotild be ten families who
shoiild be "of good and honest conversation and Orthodox in
religion " and that " a pious. Orthodox and able minister be main-
tained here." Only such as were sound in the faith coiild have
land granted them within the new town. So did Stow guarantee
the qiialit}^ of its first settlers.

For nearly twenty j^ears this chosen people sought for " a pioiis.
Orthodox and able minister " to dwell among them ; but onlv after
seven failures to secure a man did the eighth man — the Rev. John

8 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OE THE

Eveletli — decide to remain. For seventeen years Mr. Eveleth
ministered — let us hope successfiilly — to the needs of his people ;
and it was during his ministry — though not for two or three 3'ears
after his coming (in 1699 or 1700) — that a church was regularly
organized and a creed or covenant, now unfortunately lost, was
adopted. Since that time, now two hundred years ago, there has
been no break, no lack of continuity in the life of the church,
nor has it been for any length of time without either its settled
minister or its regular supply. This is interesting and unusual —
that for so long a time there should be no continued break in the
services of the society.

I find upon the church records the names of seventeen ministers
who have served the society for longer or shorter periods of time.
Of these, four seem to have been supplies and to have remained
only about one year (or less) each. Three others seem not to have
been ordained or installed here and hence not to have been full
pastors but only " the hired servants " of the society.

If we deduct these seven names there will remain for the ten
installed pastors an average service of twenty years each. Even
the seventeen men would have an average pastorate of nearly twelve
years each. This is unusual — for modern pastorates are very
short. And the longer pastorates here show well the character
and habit of the church — the stability of its aim and purpose.

But it is a matter of much greater interest, that of the entire
period of two hundred years, Dwre than half by eleven years was
covered by the ministry of two men — the Rev. John Gardner serv-
ing fifty-seven years and Rev. Jonathan Newell fifty-four j^ears.

I like to think of those years and what they must have meant.
I like to think of the beautiful thing it was to see tiuo men giving
the best of their lives to the service of their people ; I like to
think of the deepening love, the close growing together of the
hearts of pastor and people till it became almost a better thing just
to see these men about the streets and to feel sure of their interest
and sympathy in all the deepest and best life of the community —
almost a better thing that — I say — than to hear other men preach,
— their very presence being a benediction.

I cannot say of course what a lengthening ministry may mean
to the people. I know only the minister's side. But I am sure that
for hi)n each added year means deeper interest, means growing
more and more into the lives of the people and the interests of the
communit}' till whatever concerns his people becomes to the

JflRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 9

pastor almost a personal matter and an occasion for personal joy
or personal sorrow. I cannot understand how any man can stand
with a people year after year, can come close to them in their trials
and their joys, come to know their life experiences and the history
of their children and their children's children and not come to feel
a closeness to them and an interest in them which is almost pater-
nal. That is one advantage which early times had over to-day.
Then the influence of the ministry was not jiist a touch-and-go
influence — a merely transcient force. It reached down to the roots
of the life and was a power for good, ever deepening because it was
founded upon intimate knowledge.

Then, too, an added reason for long pastorates — for the first
twenty-five years of his ministry every man flounders, blunders,
makes mistakes, sometimes serious ones, which can be corrected or
outgrown only with the years. We ministers at first are very like
Elihu in Job's ancient parable — full of the conceit of youth and
ignorance. We are apt to begin our work with the conviction that
if only we can get a hearing we can convert the race. At twenty-
one we are most of us (ministers) ready to attempt to run the uni-
verse, with the inevitable result that we do nothing well. Onlj^
with years and experience does wisdom come. And so I say I feel
sure that these long pastorates of half a century and more must
have been rich in gracious influences.

Of course, not all these two hundred years have been years of
undisturbed serenity, though we seem not to have had such serioiis
difficulties as some had. But not even law can compel men to
think alike. Differences began early to appear. Lil)eral thought
crept in and spread with alarming rapidity. Trouble first arose
with the Universalists. These believers began to "sign off" and
withdraw to churches in other towns. By the year 1830 these Uni-
versalists had become so numerous that a society of that faith was
formed here, which lived for twenty years. Natiirally, the rela-
tions with the mother church were never very cordial.

A little later an open rupture came, and the old church itself
passed over to a more liberal faith or mode of thought. Channing's
influence had proved potent. It resulted in many church divi-
sions, as you know. This church was no exception. Mr. John
Sibley was the last pastor called and settled by the town, and dur-
ing his ministry the break came.

"In 1833," say the records, "the First Parish was organized,
embracing all who had not withdrawn from the old church and

10 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OE THE

who were know as Unitarians.''^ That is, up to this date we had
been an Orthodox Congregational church. In 1833 we became a
Unitarian Congregational church, and Mr. Sibley, dismissed from
pastorate of the "Congregational Church and Society in Stow"
(1833), returned two years later as pastor of the "First Parish
(Unitarian) of Stow."

The transition appears to have been effected with uivich less diffi-
cultj^ than in many cases, though a delay of some months occurred
in organizing the First Parish.

It would be pleasant, did time allow, to trace the growing liberal,
ity of thought through these two hundred years, but that will prob-
ably be done next Sunday. Suffice it now to say that five different
covenants or statements of faith have been used by the church.
The two earliest of these have been lost, iiufortunately. The
third, in use in 1829 — when Mr. Sibley first came — and still found
upon our records, is in the form not of a creed but of an agreement
or bond of union, in which the candidate for admission to the
church publicly gave himself " to God, the Father, to Jesiis Christ,
the Savior, and to the enlightening influence of the Holj^ Spirit, in
a luost solemn covenant, never, never to be forgotten." The scrip-
tures of the Old and New Testaments were acknowledged to be " the
foundation of faith and the guide to life." Beyond this there is no
dogmatic statement, but those who enter into this covenant agree
"to watch over each other in brotherly love." Some years after
the division came, and when the " First Parish " had been organ-
ized as avowedly Unitarian some seven years, a new " Expression
of Faith " was adopted (in 1740), under the leadership of Rev. Mr.
Kinsley, then pastor.

This was more of a creed and reads: " We believe in the Divine
Authenticity of the Bible and agree to live in all respects as God
shall therein reveal himself to us." This broad and undogmatic
statement of faith and purpose stood unaltered until some seven
years ago (in 1895), when b}^ vote, as you remember, we adopted
what may be a no better but only a more modern form of state-
ment, namely this: "Believing with Jesus, that true religion is
summed iip in love to God and love to man, we of this church, in
the faith, freedom, and fellowship of the Gospel, unite for the
worship of God and the service of man." Under this statement
seven new members then united with the church — the last, I
think, who have done so. It will thus appear that a broad and
liberal spirit, which insisted verj' little upon dogmatic tests, has

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 11

from early days characterized this First Church of Stow, whether
in its Orthodox or its Unitarian form.

This chnrch has experienced in its life the vicissitudes through
which many a church, in country regions at least, has passed. It
has known many changes. It has had five houses of worship —
we are now occupying the fifth. It has seen the people change.
It has witnessed, and especially in recent years, its congregations
dwindle, its pews grow vacant, its attendants pass away and
their places not made good. In the records of Mr. Muzzy —
no more than thirty j^ears ago — I read often such entries as
these: "Preached to-day to one hundred and twenty-one peo-
ple"; or "Preached to one hundred and thirtj^ people"; or,
it may be, "one hundred and seven people"; or sometimes,
" eighty-four." Rarely does the record drop below sixty,
though I do find a few entries which seem more familiar, as,
" Preached to-day to thirty-seven people, but the day was warm " ;
or, " Preached to twenty-four people, and the Sundaj'-school was
omitted. It has proved a stormy day." From various causes the
congregations have grown small till to-day sixty to sixty-five is a
good number, and it is only upon special occasions that we rise to
one hundred or more. If this were peculiar to ourselves it would
be cause for immediate consideration and concern ; but it is not
peculiar to us. It is rather a general condition in which many —
perhaps most churches — at present share. The causes for it are
varied.

With waning numbers ha^•e come, also, to us as to others, waning
resources. Salaries have grown small as numbers have diminished ;
pecuniary assets are not large to-day. Yet in spite of many dis-
couragements this little church has sturdily held its way and
gone on in faith and hope. God grant it ma}^ do so yet for many
a year ! I rejoice that never yet have we been obliged to ask aid
of our parent association (the A. U. A.). I trust we may not have
to do so. There is no cause for immediate disheartenment if we
are in earnest. There are iipon the list of those to-day more or
less closely connected with this church, including only those who
would naturally come here for a service if one were needed — only
those upon whom the pastor feels at liberty to call, some sixty-two
or sixty-three families. Surel}' a society with sixtj' families need
not die unless it will. We do not propose to do so yet.

What the future may hold, and whether our children and their
children will observe here the three hundredth anniversarv, I do

12 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

not know. I do not care to predict. Let us rather now be grateful
for the past and try to get into the spirit of that past.

Let lis try to think back two hundred years and think what it
means to have two hundred j'ears of history looking down upon us.
I confess I like to get into the spirit of those years. I like to feel
their influence ; I like to feel as I stand here, week by week, that
I am not dealing with an institution of a day — a merely transient
force. I like to feel that I have behind me a record of such noble
devotion. For two full centuries now the voice of prayer and
praise has gone wp to God from this little hamlet. For two full
centuries men and women have here met the Father face to face
in life's profoundest experiences. Here have thej- brought their
trials, sorrows, joys, thanksgivings. Here have they wrestled with
temptation and disheartenment and here won the victory. Here
have they married and given in marriage ; here have they brought
their dead ; here for two hundred years have they consecrated
themselves and their children to life's noblest purposes ; and here
have they somehow found help in their need and strength to do the
Divine will. Here have they left a grand record of fidelity. I like
to recall all this. I like to think of the congregations that gath-
ered here of old, — of those who may to-daj^ fill our seemingly
empty pews with an invisible congregation, crowding our little
house to overflowing with an unseen, immortal presence. Who
wovild dare say this may not be true ?

This is not the time to mention names — but we all know them —
the names of those who have worshiped here and have left a
record of noble consecration and fidelity.

And there are manj^ whom no preacher of to-day can name, but
whom you know and whose names are written iipon your hearts in
characters of loyalty and love. Is it nothing to feel their presence
as you gather here in this church which was your father's and 3^our
father's father's church, as it is yours? Is it nothing to belong to
this line of descent ? Is it nothing to come into the inheritance
of their spirit and to feel, it may be, the mantle of that spirit de-
scending upon us ?

Would, indeed, that upon this occasion of our Two Hiindredth
Anniversary we might do souiethiiig to show our appreciation of
our precious inheritance — something to show fittingly our love
for the little First Church of Stow, now two centuries old.

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 13

" Loug may the ancient nieetiug-house
Rise frotn the village green,
And over all the country round
Its helfried tower be seen.

Still may the call to praise and prayer

Be heard each Sunday morn,
And bind in growing faith the past

With ages yet unborn."

(Notes Not Included in Sermon.)

After the old church became Unitarian several attempts were
made to establish an Orthodox chiirch, but without miich success.
In 1839 a chvirch was started, which lasted a few years and had two
ministers. But in 1852 so many withdrew to the church in May-
nard that the Orthodox church here died. The movement for a
stricter church was revived again some seven years ago, wdien the
"Union Chapel" was established by Rev. Mr. Corless (Baptist)
and others. This "Chapel" is still flourishing, the predominant
element being probably the Baptist influence.

The Methodist chttrch in Gleasondale is the child of the church
in Marlboro.

The first society and house of worship was at " Gospel Hill,"
now in Hudson. The church and society was transferred to " Rock
Bottom " in 1855. Although not an offshoot of the First Parish it
took awa}' some families who formerly worshiped here.

DISCOURSE BY SAMUEL COLLINS BEANE, D. D.

Delivered Sunday, July 27, 1902.

JFe are not children of the bondivouian, hut of the fire. — Gai^a-
TiANS IV. 31.

In the early days of the seventeenth century a little company of
men and women in Scrooby, England, one of a small number of
similar groups, had separated themselves from the national church
in which they had been brought up, and as a band of Christian
disciples on their own account and in their own way were worship-
ing at private houses, as the early Christians did. This they did
in departiire from what they deemed to be the errors, moral evils,
and spiritual oppressions practised by the mother church, in which
they would have no share. In doing this they defied the law, and
imperilled their liberty, their property, and their very lives for
conviction's sake.

In 1608 most of them resolved to flee from the despotic spiritual
guardianship of their native England, and after great hindrance
from the law-officers, escaped into Holland, where, under a liberal
government, and among appreciative Christian friends, they re.
mained for about twelve years. Then seeking a larger and more
independent career, one hundred and two souls of their company,
nearly all of them young or of middle age, set sail for the Dutch
settlements near the mouth of the Hudson river ; but either from
stress of wind and tide, or by the treachery of the commander of
their little vessel, they found themselves landed on Cape Cod, and
shortly began a settlement at Plymouth. Here they planted again
the church which they had organized in England, and maintained
in Holland, and it endtires and flourishes to this day — popularly
known now as the Unitarian Church of Plymouth. We gratefullj^
name these immigrants, the Pilgrim Fathers.

Turn to another religious group. The Puritans, with Endicott,
who settled Salem eight years later, had not, like those Mayflower
people, severed themselves from the state-church of the mother
land ; nevertheless, on reaching the Massachusetts shore, they
organized independently after the pattern of their Plymouth
brethren. From these two churches has sprung every Congrega-

16 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

tional church or society on this side of the Atlantic, whether now
known as Unitarian or Trinitarian. Vastly more than this. If I
read history aright, it is from the pattern and genius of these two
small churches in the New England wilderness that has sprung our
republic itself — the rule of the people in things spiritual being
simply and naturally transformed into the rule of the people in
things civil and political. It is at least significant that Thomas
Jefferson in Virginia and the Reverend Jonathan Mayhew in Boston
each first saw the possibility and desirability of a civil government
in America, of and by the people, from observing the workings of
a church of the Congregational polity.

What, then, was the early church of New England, the type and
seed of so much that we now hold dear and indispensable ?

It was a church of the people. The people were the entire sum
of its existence — no pope, no bishop, no priest, no parliament to
legislate, no council to decree. It had no appointed prayers, no
prescribed ritual. Its minister was simply a man chosen by the
people of the church in free meeting, to be, for the time, their
preacher and teacher. He was a minister only by their creation ;
and when he ceased to perform for them his appointed functions,
he ceased to be a minister, unless, or until, some other congrega-
tion took him up and made a minister of him again. He was the
people's minister, a servant and not a reetor, or ruler, as the
English church called, and still calls, its priests.

Each church was independent. When at the ordination of the
first ministers at vSalem, Plj^mouth was represented by a delegation
to express S3^mpathy and brotherhood, the delegates claimed no
authority even to advise, and the vSaleni Christians would have
resented such advice unasked.

Such, in brief, were the churches of these New England colonies
in the first half of the seventeenth century. W^hat, then, was the
fundamental principle of a New England church in those primitive
years? It is stated in its full meaning by John Robinson, the
pastor of the Pilgrims : "In the gathering of a church," he says,
" I do tell you, that, in what place soever, whether hy preaching
the Gospel by a true minister, by a false minister, by no minister,
or by reading and conference, or by any other means of publishing
it, two or three faithful people do arise, separating themselves
from the world into the fellowship of the Gospel, they are a church
truly gathered." Again, Robert Browne, the reputed spiritual
father of Congregationalism, writes: "Nor are ministers, or their

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 17

power, necessary to the first gathering of a church . . . but
the power is in ourselves immediatel}'."

Let us now turn to the covenants of the early New England
churches, of which those of Plymouth and Salem are clear ex-
amples. And here let nie say that there was, in no church, a form-
ulated creed, there were no listed doctrines ; simply religious
agreements or pledges, often of one or two sentences only. Omit-
ting the unimportant parts, the Plymouth church covenant ran
thus: "We, the Lord's free people, join ourselves . . . into a
chiirch estate in the fellowship of the Gospel, to walk in all His
ways made known to us, or to be made known to us, according to
our best endeavor." Notice not more its brevity and its singleness
of purpose, than its breadth and progressive outlook — ^ " to walk
in all His ways, made known to us, or to be made known to us."
They had not yet attained. They were still learners. They did
not venture on a formulated and finished creed.

The Salem covenant of 1629 is even briefer, while it is similarly
broad and undogmatic : " We covenant with the Lord and with one
another, and do bind ourselves in the presence of God, to walk
together in all his waj^s, according as he is pleased to reveal him-
self in his blessed word of truth." This was all.

Who of us to-day could not bind ourselves bj^ such covenants, and
stand on such platforms, without bondage and without misgiving?

Those people had had a surfeit of priesthood, of councils, of
magnates meddling with their spiritual concerns. Henceforth the
people, "the Lord's free people," were themselves, under God, to
rule in the church, nay more, to constitute the church, and to be
the whole of it.

To be sure there was less diversity of theological belief than
manifests itself in our time, but it seems to have been the sincere
piirpose of these long tormented people to join the whole religious
community together in one devout and peaceful fold. The Salem
covenant, says William Bentley, the distinguished scholar and his-
torian, " never could be intended so much to display opinions, as
by written obligation to fasten men together."

But, as time went on, the spirit of Christian unity, that like a
magnet drew all together at first, began slowly to weaken. With
the growth of communities different beliefs and various tastes arose.
As the Puritans, by lapse of time, forgot in a measure the suffer-
ings they and their fathers had undergone for liberty's sake, the
enthusiasm for liberty cooled down, and the ideas of libertv became

18 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OE THE

confused. As early as 1650 one and another church had, chiefly
for the instruction of the young, devised certain statements of doc-
trines. After a while one and another church began to use these
statements as tests of membership and fellowship. This was the
little rift which years afterwards resulted in the disruption of so
many chiirches, and the lamentable bitterness of sectarianism from
which we suffer even in our day.

That all this dividing apart on theological opinions was con-
trary to the original Congregational idea of an inclusive church of
which all the religious people should be members and rulers
together, I need not take time to show. Just as, long afterward,
the unity of the American people in the love of freedom, as
declared in the Declaration of National Independence, grew less
strong by increase of sectional interests and debate over political
dogmas, resulting at length in secession and the Civil War, so in
that earlier time the unifying spirit and principle of Congrega-
tionalism, which is simply democracy and independence in the
church, yielded to the narrowness of theological tenets and the
hateful rivalries of sect and creed.

By the time the church in Stow was organized this dogmatic
and disuniting spirit had received a strong and sad momentum,
chiefly from certain ministers who prided themselves on their
" sacred scholarship" and theological acumen, and grew arrogant
in the assertion of them. The church in Stow was founded ten
years after the witchcraft trials and executions in Salem, in which
certain autocratic ministers had acted so direful a part. There had
come to be a morbid and feverish desire to hunt up everything
which by a passage of Scripture could be put under condemnation
or suspicion. The Old Testament command " Thou shalt not suffer
a witch to live," just suited the existing mental mood, and twenty
good men and women were execiited in that one year, 1692, at
Salem.

The first covenant of the church in Stow, if it could be found,
would doubtless show considerable of that same spirit which in its
darkness and severity had so recently sent a score of worthy Chris-
tians to their death for no actual sin or fault whatever, and on evi-
dence as abs^ird as ever convulsed the listeners at a mock trial.

It is a fact of singular interest to you and me to-day that the
Rev. Samuel Parris, who, before the organization of this church
had been employed for a short time as preacher by the people of
Stow, became afterwards the pastor at vSalem Village, now Danvers,

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 19

where, iu 1692, he took the lead in the prosecution and putting to
death of what are known in history as the Salem witches. It is
his name that occiirs so often and luridly in the records of those
trials which are still preserved. And it is of additional interest to
us to-day that five years after that melancholy event iu which he
had taken so leading and tragic a part he was recalled by the
people of Stow to be their minister again, and for a short time
resumed his ministerial services here. Evidently his participation
and leadership in the Salem affair did not lower him seriousl3^
if at all, in the minds of the Stow people of that time ! Had that
stiperstitious mania mastered Mr. Parris during one of his two
short residences here, rather than, as it happened, between the
two, then it is likely that some of your ancestors of this town
woiild have fallen victims to his blind crediility and unrelenting
will, and Stow, not Salem, would have had the world-wide notori-
ety of the witchcraft tragedies.

Now, just as surely as religion becomes cruel or unlovely, its
power and influence begin to be undermined. Never was Eng-
land more unreligious than at the time, or shortly following the
time, when she was inflicting threat and torment upon the fviture
fathers of New England for their style and conscience of worship.
At that day, in the English church, a well-behaved and sober-
minded priest was an exception. Never, again, has New England
been so unreligious as during the period that soon followed the
priestly rule of Cotton Mather, aided by colleagues like Samuel
Parris and Nicholas No3'es. The bigotry and stern wilfulness of
prominent members of the clergy resulted in alienating many
of the people from the church and its ministers. That period,
embracing about the first forty years of the seventeen-hundreds,
has been characterized in common speech as the period of the
" Great Declension." During that time it would seem as if a large
number of the Massachusetts chiirches would have gone out of
existence had they not been supported by town taxation under
compiilsory laws, with the sheriff at their back. On the present
voluntary system probably not one in three of them would have
survived to tell the storj'. Many of the people were beginning,
under sharp provocation, to use their reason. They were getting
weary of priestly rule and autocratic creed-making. Many who did
not doubt the reality of wntchcraft in the world still believed that
the evidence in the vSalem cases had its origin largely in personal
spite, and that the animus of the affair had been cruel and out-

20 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERvSARY OF THE

rageous. Piety had come to be at a low ebb. The reaction from
the old order was terrible. Many of the churches were well nigh
abandoned. Nor were there then any voices of great believers and
prophets to rouse the people in their spiritual natures.

But an awakening came at length. Jonathan Edwards appeared,
and Whitefield and the disciples of Wesley, all representing in dif-
ferent degrees the old order, but with it a fervent and entrancing
conviction of spiritual realities. And ere long the people became so
awakened that many of them, in the interests of religious truth and
divine reason, were ready to cast off the old system altogether —
turning their backs even upon Edwards and Whitefield. Those
wonderful preachers had indeed produced a " Great Awakening " ;
but the result of every sharp spiritual aroiasal is, in good time,
to bring men to a sense of their souls" rights and their personal
liberties.

Before many years the American Revolution came, and the polit-
ical j'oke of England was thrown off. What the Revolution meant
politically we all know well enough. What it meant religiously
and theologically is perhaps more important. It meant the divine
rights of man, civil, spiritual, intellectual — his right to partici-
pate in his own government — his equal right to think and judge,
to believe and worship, in his own way, on his own account. It
meant a tj'rannical parliament and a stupid-souled king discredited
and banished from power in these colonies ; it equally meant the
New England minister, who had so perverted his trust as servant
of the people, and had tvirned self-appointed spiritual despot,
remanded to his proper place.

See more specifically what the Revolution implied. Its Decla-
ration of Independence declared men — all men — to be, not ruined
creatures, as the creeds said and the clergy had been preaching, —
not demons of evil who do wrong in preference to right, and sin as
naturally and almost as inevitably as the sparks fly upward, — but
beings upright by nature, natural kings and princes under God, fit
for self-government — mentally and morally competent to help
rule the land. The Declaration declared by implication that every
man in his normal state is so in free communion with the soiirce
of all right and goodness that he is a heaven-appointed ruler of the
country he lives in, and that no power on earth, in church, or
state, or anywhere, has a right to govern him against his consent.
Till that old idea of man's total depravity was denied or put in the
background there could have been no movement for a liberal gov-

I^IRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 21

eminent like ours ; for who could be insane enough to entrust a
commonwealth or republic to the management of totally depraved
human beings ? The common run of men did not see the logic of
all this, but the great leaders saw or felt it. There is now no doubt
that Washington, John Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, and, with few
exceptions, every man of that period whose name we presume to
rank with theirs, were Unitarians in principle, if not in dogma, hold-
ing the most exalted religious views of man's nature and dignities,
and believing in salvation by character, and not by creed or sub-
stitution. I cannot, with mtich searching, find a single utterance
in the speech or in the letters of any prominent American patriot
of that time which is keyed to the note of Calvinism.

Hardly had the Revolution ended, when these religious views of
man and his high destiny became agitated in nearly all the Congre-
gational churches of New England. This agitation is now known
as the Unitarian movement, dating, in its more vigorous state, from
about the year 1780. It resulted, at length, in the division of the
great Congregational body of Massachusetts into the Unitarian and
Trinitarian wings — the liberal party predominating in nearly every
considerable parish along the sea-board, ruling the College at Cam-
bridge, and setting the type of religious and intellectual life in
Massachusetts.

In this division the church and town of Stow when the issue
fairl}' came, heartily espoused the liberal side.

It would be interesting and instructive to read the written agree-
ment which bound these Stow Christians together at the organiza-
tion of the church in the very beginning of the eighteenth century.
But that, as well as the second covenant, is missing. I fear, as I
just said, that it shared something of the theological rigidness of
the period. Nearly all the churches suffered from the priestcraft
of that unhappy epoch. Nor do I undertake to say that the orig-
inal framers of those early free covenants lived always up to them.
It was too early in the world's history to expect this. Moreover,
their life here was so disturbed and imperilled that it would have
been almost impossible for them to practise unbounded religious
toleration, and not to ward away, or put in arrest, some persons
whose existence among them threatened their own religious liber-
ties, and meant the possible or probable overturning of the fair
estate they had so well planted in the wilderness. But that they
had and cherished the ideal of largeness and liberty which is in-
volved in the various church covenants of the time, and saw it as

22 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

the high end to be aimed at and striven for, there can be no reason-
able doubt. Their working by-laws did not always harmonize with
their organic or theoretic constitution. Their conduct, under diffi-
culty and danger, not infrequently contradicted their principles.
Alas ! is not that the way with all of us ?

Out of that period of its birth and infancy, and the influences
then dominant, this church, like many another, has had to climb,
step by step, into larger freedom and sweeter Christian fellowship.
Its covenant, first in use in 1829, is delightfully broad and Christian,
and well calculated to band together an entire religious community.
In 1840 its members voted : " We believe in the divine authenticity
of the Bible, and agree to live in all respects as God shall therein
reveal himself." In 1895 this church, in a new manifesto, mounted
up to that Christian freedom and simplicity which is so perfectly
expressed in the Plymouth and Salem covenants of 1602 and 1629 :
" Believing with Jesus that triie religion is summed up in love to
God and love to man, we of this church, in the faith, freedom and
fellowship of the Gospel, unite for the worship of God and the ser-
vice of man." This might well have been written by John Robin-
son, the Pilgrims' minister. It is pure Congregationalism in its
native width and largeness, in its ample adaptation to all the relig-
ious people. May this church, this grand old toAvn-church of Stow,
always wave such a banner !

I have thus far spoken of the New England churches chiefly with
reference to their popular membership and proceedings. I must
not neglect to bring before you a little more clearlj^ the part which
the minister has acted in these old New England towns. In theory,
and in fact, as I said, the Congregational minister is only one of the
people, with no superior rights or authority. This is true to the
letter. Nevertheless, the Congregational minister in our part of
the world, has had an influence peculiarly his own, from early daj-s
till now, which, in proportion to his talents, has been greater than
that of any other member of his community. Especially has it
been so, and is so still, in the church of a country town, like this
charming and fair-famed town of vStow. The pastor here has had
no ritual to ply, no theological system to be continually working
upon in his pent-up study. He is largely an out-door man. His
duties and relations are commensurate with the life of the town.
He is of the people. F'rom the beginning he has been the leader
and supervisor of the people's education. The schools, piiblic and
private, have been his peculiar charge. His liberal culture fits him

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 2/5

intellectually for this function. He knows hooks, and studies
methods. He is familiar with the parents and the children. Pro-
fessor Stowe of Andover once wrote: " My experience has taught
me to despair of establishing, with any permanency, even a good
district school, where there is not a good church, and an intelligent
minister to watch over it." Often the minister has taken his turn
and set the pattern of teaching. Rev. Dr. Bentley of Salem wrote
in his diary in 1786 : "I altered the time of the school terms. . . .
After prayer heard the boys read in turn, then sent them to their
classes and writing-desks. . . . Then mended all the pens." Why
not?

In agricultural towns, in earh- times, the pastor was a farmer,
and sometimes the best one of them all. He was a politician, and
watched carefully, as he ought, the turn of public affairs. He had,
as some one said of him long ago, " a good judgment in secular-
ities." As a rule he could hunt and fish with his hardiest parish-
ioners. He probably had a larger correspondence with the rest of
the world by mail than had all his flock combined. He set the
taste in books, he furnished the pattern of decorum. I must not
forget to say, that as early as one hundred and fifty years ago, he
was a good laugher and cheerful story-teller. Up to the early years
of the nineteenth century, the minister, like all New England gen-
tlemen, wore a powdered wig and queue. Like his parishioners,
the country minister of a hundred and fifty years ago was often clad
in leathern breeches, both during the week and in the pulpit. It
was a minister, Nathaniel Ward of Ipswich, who devised the first
civil code of Massachusetts. It was a minister, Hugh Peter of
Salem, who first put this colony into a healthy financial and busi-
ness condition. It was a minister, Jonathan Newell of Stow, who
by his invention, gave to the world the great mechanical and com-
mercial benefit of cut nails.

At just the period when this church was organized, as we have
seen, the ministers of the larger or seaport towns, who, like the
Mathers, father, son, and grandson, had grown big in scholarship
and spiritual egotism, began to lose something of their unnatural
and uncougregational prestige. Some of them had got to be little
popes. But a turn in affairs had come, which was changing them
back into ministers, that is, servants, of the people. The witch-
craft matter seems to have been the last pound of the iinendurable
load. The blind, dumb following of ministers thenceforth began
to abate. The people were beginning again to use their mental and

24 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

Spiritual wits. Fortunately for Stow, when John Eveleth was set-
tled as its first pastor, that official in Massachusetts was soon com-
ing to be what his title was meant to import — a helper, and not a
dictator. The elder President Dwight of Yale, writing about the
year 1800, saj^s : "The real weight of clergymen in Massachusetts
and Connecticut consists wholly in their influence — an influence
derived wholh- from their office and their character."

The all-round character of a minister's vocation in a country
town — as farmer, writer, educator, counsellor, leader in all manner
of citizenship, tended to widen, enrich and mellow his nature. He
was in live touch with all the people, from the babe he had just
christened to the wrinkled nonagenarian. He had to bear a hand
in a hundred matters besides sermon-making and studying books.
He was settled for life and he expected to breathe his last breath
among his people, and that a modest slab would one day mark his
bodv's resting-place in the village burying-grouud. The town
church was for e\ery orderly citizen and his family the social cen-
ter ; it was the rallying point for all Christian and htimane
endeavor in common. People who differed never so variously came
up once a week to shake hands, and to worship together the same
God with Christian devoutness and good-will.

Now let us for a moment glance at the world's clock when the
Congregational church of Stow was organized. It was within a
year of the founding of Yale College ; it was two years before the
printing of the first American newspaper ; it was several years
before the establishing of the first regular post-office on this side
of the Atlantic. Surely it was a time when the church and its
educated ministry must needs fill a large and mighty place in the
people's life.

At the time this church was gathered, the minister was elected
by the people, the church members first nominating a candidate
and handing over their choice for the whole body of voting citizens
to approve or reject. Sometimes the church named two or more
candidates from whom the entire assembly of voters made choice
of the one under whose ministrations they all — both saints and
sinners — thought they covild most happily or profitably sit.
Some stringent Christians contended that the final election should
be made bj' the church-members onl}% but the people resisted that
claim, and have resisted, and resisted triumphantly, ever since.
At that time the minister preached his own ordination sermon.

First parish church, stow, mass. 2o

sometimes an older clergyman, for his wnsdom's sake, delivering
another discourse on the same occasion.

The meeting-house of early days was never lighted for evening
service ; it was never warmed by artificial heat. The sermon was
often much more than an hovir in length, rarely less ; the sand-glass
on the pulpit — for there were few other time-pieces — not infre-
quently being tiirned more than once during the service, be the
temperature, outside or inside, never so far below zero.

The order of worship about the year 1700 was exceediugh- plain
and of few part?. Until about fifty j^ears later there was no scrip-
ture-reading, such an exercise seeming to our Puritan ancestors to
savor of a ritual performance. The almost universal order of wor-
ship was this :

First. The Long Prayer.

Second. The singing of a Psalm from the Old Testament, either
in the usual version, or in some metrical rendering. What we call
hymns were unknown in Sunday worship.

Third. The Sermon.

Fourth. A vShorter Prayer.

Fifth. Another Psalm-Singing.

Sixth. The Benediction : " The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, be with
you all."

Often the benediction was prefaced with, " Blessed are they that
hear the word of God and do it," — said bj' the minister.

Such was the homely and unadorned style of worship that edi-
fied and satisfied the people of New England two centuries ago.

I have thus very imperfectl}^ sketched the main principles and
some of the practices of the Congregational or people's church,
with a few hints of later evolutions.

I wish that I had time to speak to you of some of the ministers
who have officiated in this Stow church, whom it has been my priv-
ilege to know, beginning with John Langdon Sibley, including,
among those who have passed from earth, such excellent pastors
as Reuben Bates and my dear friend George F. Clark, including,
also, some of the living whom I greatly esteem, and ending with
your present minister, who to your great profit has been so long
with you. May yoiir existing relations continue for years to come !

Can any one doubt, even from this hasty consideration, that
Congregational principles and the Congregational spirit, in their
natural unfolding, are very broad and liberal, charitaljle and in-

26 TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

elusive ? Nor do these priuciples and this spirit shine the less
brightly, or show themselves the less practicable, because the early
fathers or their children did not always carry them to their per-
fect ultimate.

It should also be clear to us that when the separation came a
century ago, and the Congregational body was split apart, it was
the liberal party that, in the matter of unity and tolerance, most
perfectly adhered to the Congregational ideas. It was the liberal
wing, whatever its faults and shortcomings — and they were many —
that restored the largeness and simplicity of the original covenants.
It was the liberal or Unitarian wing that, in the legal contest for
the possession of church property, insisted, according to long-time
precedent, that not a handful, more or less, of church-members
should control the meeting-house and manage the general funds
and elect the ministers, but the people of the congregation or par-
ish in their broad religioiis interests. It was the same wing, as in
this church of Stow, that in due time abolished all dogmatic tests
of membership and communion. With all its mistakes and trans-
gressions the liberal wing committed not this one, namely, to split
the hitherto peaceful communities into theological and sectarian
divisions ; but with whatever wisdom and power these liberals had
they strove to keep the people one and undivided in the dear
Master's name.

I need not remind you how, under their mild and tolerant rule,
theology has mellowed and grown reasonable, how metaphysical
dogmas, which nobody could clearly Understand, and which bene-
fited nobody, biit which chiefly served to provoke discord and
intolerance, have given way to a religion of life and character,
according to the ttninvolved teachings of Jesus. The so-called
liberal wing would have no narrow and hateful separation between
God's children on earth, and for the world to come it would not
allow eternal happiness for one, and for another everlasting banish-
ment from the Heavenly Father's presence. Are not those of our
towns and cities sweeter and wholesomer to live in where the ami-
able and tolerant tA'pe of Congregational Christianity of which I
have spoken has simplified and humanized religion and weakened
the nerve of sectarian rancor ?

In no part of New England, I believe, did this liberalizing of
religion work more admirable results than in these old town
churches of Middlesex and Worcester. In no other section, I
believe, has the standard of Christian character and experience for

FIRST PARISH CHURCH, STOW, MASS. 27

the last three generations been more upright, devont, and trul}'
Christlike than in this particular region.

What in the history of this church of Stow I honor more than
almost any other one thing is its patient and earnest endeavor to
maintain Christian unity, and to ward off dissension and separation
for human dogmas' wretched sake. In this endeavor it has some-
times suffered temporary loss of numbers and support. But to
this day has bravely and magnanimouslj^ stood this old First
Church, striving and praying to fulfil the Master's prayer, "that
they all may be one."

May this church live and prosper and be strong in its uplifting
and regenerating influence for centuries to come ! Let us believe
that its work is but fairly begun, since life and truth are large
beyond measure, and God's days and ages are exceedingly long.

It was assumed by your fathers and founders that the Protestant
families of this town, iinless the town should gather too large a
population, should and ovight to agree to kneel before their God
together on a broad and simple religious basis, even as they vote
together, educate their children together, rejoice and mourn
together, bury their dead together, and live happily and thankfully
in each other's neighborhood. Can it be that the religion of Jesus
is narrower and more circumscribed than any other important
life-interest ?

This church to-day, with a covenant which all Christians can
understand and approve, extends its warm and wide-open hand,
without question of honest theological difference, to every God-
loving and truth-seeking person within its reach.

It is a thousand times more important that thus, like the early
disciples who often wrangled among themselves, but who agreed
to love the Master together, and worship his God and their God
together, the people of a community should be one in spirit in spite
of differences of opinion, one in mutual love, one in bowing before
God and serving mankind with one heart and voice, than that this
person or that person should have his particular sectarian name,
or mode of baptism, or style of prayer-book.

Let us hope that the day of separation and exclusion for theolog-
ical opinion's sake is drawing to a happy close. Let the central
and unquestionable and eternal things actuate us more and more.
Still does the Heavenly Father watch lovingly over his churches.
Still is Jesus, in his clear simplicity, the way and truth and
life. Still is libert}^ the essential condition of true piety, since a

28

TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE

soiil ill spiritual fetters caunot worship the Father in spirit and
in truth. Still does he who leaned on Jesus' bosom whisper to us,
" Little children, love one another ! " Still does the clarion voice
of Paul proclaim, as of old, that in Christ there is no heresy but
intolerance and lack of brotherlj^ love. Heeding these heavenly
calls and monitions, the future is still bright for the churches of
God named for his divinest Son.

JUL 30 1903

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